


A Day like Today

by VanillaMostly



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Drug Addiction, Family, Gen, POV Minor Character, POV Multiple, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-19
Updated: 2013-08-19
Packaged: 2017-12-23 23:34:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,927
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/932409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VanillaMostly/pseuds/VanillaMostly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Undersee family on the morning of their daughter's first reaping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Day like Today

 

Mayor Undersee woke up with a weight in the pit of his stomach, the dreams he had dreamed too vivid in his mind. He rubbed his eyes; they felt heavy. He rolled over to face the window. Only a dim orange light peeked through the curtains.

 

He looked at his watch. It was a little past five.

 

Beside him, his wife mumbled something into the pillow. In her sleep she looked younger and could almost be peaceful, but for the frown that etched her forehead.

 

Mayor Undersee touched her on the shoulder, then thought better of it. Slowly he rose, wincing at the ache in his knees - since his injury as a child, it had never stopped being a bother, though it was mostly easy to ignore - and shuffled to the bathroom. Turned on the light.

 

The medicine cabinet was partly open. He slammed it shut with a force that surprised even himself, but only silence followed. His wife had not stirred.

 

 _Not today,_ he reminded himself. _Not today._

 

Out in the hall, he quietly creaked apart Madge's door, looking in. His daughter was sprawled on her stomach - just like her mother, an image that made Mayor Undersee shut his eyes briefly. Her feet stuck out from under her quilt. Gently, he readjusted it; Madge shifted but thankfully did not wake. He watched her and wished quite impossibly that she could sleep forever, like the princess in one of the stories he had read her when she was little.

 

He looked around the room; one or two paintings adorned the walls; a notebook was open on her desk; her school uniform hung at the door; her disc player was blinking on stand-by. Sometime along the way Madge had replaced her dolls and tea party sets with books and her music collection. How had he not noticed? His daughter was growing up. He looked at Madge, but all he could see was still the little girl who used to beg him for a piggyback.

 

He smoothed her hair once, then turned and carefully closed the door. He continued his way down the stairs. Somewhere out there a bird was chirping. It was going to be a beautiful day, cruelly enough.

 

He brewed some coffee and looked in the fridge. Taya, the good woman, had restocked recently. He took out the eggs, flour, milk and butter, trying not to knock any pans. Even so, he had just turned on the stove when Taya walked in.

 

"Sorry. Did I-"

 

"Wasn't you," said Taya gruffly. "Bree snorin' all over the place. Couldn't sleep."

 

"You could take the guest room. I offered, didn't I?" He knew she wouldn't. She and Bree went at each other's throats all the time, but that was what sisters did.

 

Sisters. But what did he know? Mel was right. He never had any. No sisters, no brothers, just his mother. She had died when Mayor Undersee was in his second year of service- but it wasn't the same. It had simply been her time, and he had been there by her bedside, holding her hand...

 

"Sir, everythin' alright?" Taya's usually gnarly voice was uncharacteristically kind.

 

Mayor Undersee swallowed. "I..."

 

"It's a tough day. For all parents."

 

Even mayors, she meant to say.

 

 _Someone has to do it,_ his mother had said everytime he had been ready to quit his job, back when he had only been a law clerk in the Capitol government. _Just think, Clyde - if you go, who will they get to take your place?_

 

But his mother, who supported him so fiercely, believed in him so confidently, was gone, and in her place was doubt, sobriety, and a conscience that prickled no matter what he did. Perhaps it was a good thing, that she didn't live long enough to see him as he was now, her son who once, as a boy, had whispered to her, _I'm going to change things, Mom, when I grow up._ If his past self had known what kind of man he would grow up to be-

 

Taya was speaking again. Mayor Undersee struggled to focus on what she said, instead of the images from his dream.

 

"Your wife, sir- she's a parent too..."

 

Mayor Undersee nodded along, watching his pancake sizzle.

 

"...time she acted like one."

 

He was surprised by the sudden hardness in Taya's tone. He turned to see that she was staring sternly at him, arms crossed. Realization dawned. "You heard us... last night?"

 

"The whole house heard you," she said grimly. "You're lucky you've got your own yard, or else the neighbors would'a too. And it was more'n last night."

 

He wasn't thinking of the neighbors, though. He was thinking of Madge. Her bedroom was just down the hall from theirs. Once a chatterbox, now a quiet stranger who shut the door to her room more and more often... he had thought that was just part of her transition into a teenager.

 

"You had it right, you know," Taya went on. "In my mind you should'a put your foot down long ago."

 

"It's not her fault, Taya," he said, strangely defensive- when only last night he had been on the offensive end. "You know what happened to her-"

 

"-twin. Yes, I know. Most people know." Taya sighed. "I'm not sayin' it's her fault. It's never easy, and that year was worse'n the others. Look at Haymitch, the poor boy... I knew his ma - all the folks in the Seam know each other, one way or other and all. When he was growin' up the lil' tyke was climbin' trees and prankin' teachers and drivin' everyone mad... Now look at him. Look what they done to him. He might'a lived, but can you call that-"

 

Taya broke off. The kitchen was quiet, but for the sizzling of the pancakes. Mayor Undersee could not trust himself to speak. He swallowed the lump in his throat, but to no avail.

 

Taya's voice grew softer. "Now I know it ain't my business to butt in... but look, your wife needs help. Her problem don't _look_ that bad - she don't show it like Haymitch does - but it's the same. 'Course, I don't know much about the stuff she uses- they can't afford that in the Seam - but if she keeps at it the way she's been doin'-"

 

"I know, Taya."

 

She paused. He could imagine her brown brows rising high on her lined forehead. "So why-?"

 

He rubbed his eyes. They were truly heavy today. "The Capitol... only there, they have the proper places... the doctors... to treat her- problem."

 

"Then get her up there! Ain't you the mayor?"

 

Even as soon as Taya said that, she fell silent. Just sat at the kitchen table, rapping the wood with her bony knuckles. Tap, tap. She must have guessed enough, because she gave a frustrated sort of groan.

 

Then she was quiet.

 

"Really, everyone's got their loss, don't they... My youngest boy, a pretty lad he was, too. Got picked when he was fifteen. Never stood a chance. Gal from One hacked him to pieces."

 

She caught Mayor Undersee's eye and waved her hand, grimacing.

 

"Save your sorries, sir. Sorries won't bring my boy back, will they?" Taya pinned her steel gray eyes on him. "See, that's what I'm sayin'. Everyone's got their loss and sure, it hurts like damn hell, but we get over it. We go on livin' 'cause that's what people do. Your wife- it was her twin, I get that's bad, but the girl's dead. She's got an alive lil' girl who-"

 

"Taya," he said.

 

Good old Taya cast him a long look, but she held her tongue. Mayor Undersee scraped the last of the pancakes onto a plate and pushed it towards her. With a grudging nod, she accepted one.

 

"You?" she asked him.

 

He shook his head.

 

Taya replied with a little shake of her head. Her sympathy and her sadness was all written plain as day on her old, worn face. But, good woman that she was, she said nothing, just picked up a pancake and bit into it.

 

"This pancake could use some more sugar," declared Taya, chewing. "Well, you cook better than Bree, at least. She can darn a sock well enough but her food's made for pigs. You haven't seen her chicken broth..."

 

Mayor Undersee sipped his coffee, listened gratefully, and tried not to think of his dream or the day to come.

 

**

 

Mel Donner, or Mel Undersee, as she was now, lay awake in her bed.

 

Contrary to what her husband believed, she had not used last night. But what difference did it make?  She had thought about doing it. No, she had nearly done it. The syringe had been in her hand...

 

She was tempted to latch onto the fact that she didn't, as if this proved she was strong, that she was a good wife and a good mother. But that was ridiculous. As she pressed her face into the pillow, already a part of her itched for it. Her skin crawled for it.

 

No. She couldn't.

 

Not today.

 

Somehow she found herself rising, pushing away the covers, striding past the medicine cabinet and stepping into the shower for the first time in - she couldn't even remember. Her hair was a stiff mass of tangled mess. She spent forever scrubbing just the layer of dead cells from her neck. Under the steaming hot shower, she traced her finger traced over the scar on her stomach, a long line going horizontally, far below her belly button.

 

This, she remembered just as if it was yesterday: the grueling pain, the haze through which she heard the doctor say something about "complication" and "baby not right"... the sound of Clyde's cry, his tightening grip on her wrist...

 

When they later put Madge in her arms, normal and healthy and alive, Mel could barely look at her own baby's face. This child whom she had, for one moment there, imagined would die and had felt _relief._

 

There were many things wrong with her, she knew, but even that-

 

When Madge was five, Mel became pregnant again. They sat Madge down and explained to her, and Madge had been adorably indignant. "I don't want to share Mama and Daddy!" Clyde got a good laugh from that one.

 

He wasn't laughing soon enough. Mel lost the baby at two months.

 

Since then, she hadn't been able to conceive again. At some point, they stopped trying.

 

Mel turned off the shower faucet, wrapping a towel around herself. The mirror was still white with steam, but she kept the lights off as she brushed her teeth.

 

Twenty years - exactly twenty, she realized with a start - and it was, really, just a habit now. She didn't look so much like Maysilee anymore, after all. But even back then she hadn't either- not totally. Maysilee had been a few inches taller; her face had been sharper; she had been wiry where Mel had been soft. Most people didn't see that when they stood next to each other, though. Sandy blond hair, navy blue eyes, same peaked hairline and freckles across the nose. Most people stopped there.

 

The fact was, _seeing_ Maysilee wasn't what hurt _._ Mel almost felt nothing when she looked at photographs. The Maysilee in there, back straight, carefully posed... that wasn't the Maysilee Mel knew. What was there to a person's face, anyway? Nothing, without the laugh, the scowl, the voice...

 

Mel put down her hairbrush. Her hands were shaking.

 

She exited the bathroom, padding across the carpet to her dresser. Dust had gathered on her makeup set, the jewelry box, her perfumes and creams. She knew the helping hands Clyde had hired - had been driven to hire: two women from the Seam, sisters themselves, one large and cheery, one bony and surly, their differences too jarring to confuse anyone. When they cleaned, they left Mel's dresser alone. Clyde might have told them to, or most likely, they could just tell.

 

Mel opened the top drawer, reaching inside to the back. She paused when her fingers touched the soft fabric. She had to retract her hand and take a deep breath before reaching inside again.

 

Even covered up, the pin had that way on her.

 

It was another minute of staring before Mel forced herself to open up the handkerchief, revealing the familiar gleam of metal. All these years passed, and the shine had not dulled one bit. Mel supposed that made sense. Gold was long-lasting.

 

Like a curse.

 

"Not a curse," whispered Mel, to no one - the air. Maybe the pin. But the only one who needed any convincing was herself.

 

She picked it up slowly.

 

The pin had been in their family, for how long, no one knew. Mothers passed it to their oldest child- who was a girl, always been, and they passed it to theirs. Mel had whined and stomped her foot the day her mother pinned it on Maysilee's dress. She was only five minutes younger. It wasn't fair.

 

Maysilee loved the pin, though. _This pin has a history,_ she liked to say. _It's a symbol, Melly. It stands for everything we need to be._

At first Mel would roll her eyes and laugh. But when they grew older, she started to notice. That when Maysilee talked of this - and she did, except now she went on about it longer - her chin would be set and her gaze would be different. Like she was looking, but not seeing. Like she was thinking.

 

Mel did not like the pin.

Then on the last day, the last day Mel had talked to Maysilee, had hugged her...

 

_Take this. It'll keep you safe._

But it had not kept Maysilee safe, and she had been wearing it when they called her name.

 

Mel would know, later... much later, after the cannons boomed on-screen, after Maysilee's body came back to them in a casket. She would find the papers lodged in a corner of Maysilee's desk, tied up in a bundle. Anti-Capitolist essays. Copies of them. Signed, the Mockingjay. Drawn like how it was on the pin.

 

Mel knew then what Maysilee had really meant: _take this. Keep_ it _safe._

She had never hated anything so much in her life. But when Mel's mother had suggested they bury Maysilee wearing her favorite pin, Mel had refused. Probably the same reason why Sage accepted the canary. Those were a little part of Maysilee that they could keep, no matter how it pained them to see it.

 

All other things of Maysilee's were gone: the clothes, the school supplies, the old dolls and toys donated to the orphanage, to family friends. Now even the canary was dead. Or as good as dead; Mel hadn't talked to or seen Sage in years.

 

The pin was all that was left of Maysilee. Curse or not.

 

Mel folded it into her palm, ignoring the sting that came from the sharp edges. She wasn't a good mother. She wasn't even confident she had ever been, or would ever be.

 

But maybe with this, she could try to be a better one for her daughter. Before it was too late.

 

For it was too late, now, to be a better sister.

 

**

 

When the knock came at Madge's door, she expected to see Taya or Bree. Maybe Dad, even though - Madge glanced at her clock - at this time he should be on the way to the train station. It was true he didn't have to rush; Capitol people weren't exactly eager to step foot into District 12. Still, no one liked to be kept waiting.

 

But maybe he wanted to say bye before he left... even if they'd see each other in an hour.

 

Today wasn't just any reaping, as Madge knew too well.

 

Madge shut her notebook and shoved it under her desk. "Come in," she said, grabbing her headphones and jamming them onto her head.

 

The door opened slowly. That wasn't right. Taya and Bree always pounded right in.

 

"Mom?"

 

Mother offered her a small smile. She'd put up her hair and was wearing lipstick, and she didn't look half bad _._ She gestured to her ears.

 

Madge stared, confused for a moment, before remembering that she was currently "listening" to music.

 

"Yeah?" she asked, removing her headphones and pretending to turn off her player.

 

"Do you have a minute?" asked Mother. Her smile could only last so long. Now she was fidgeting with her hands and looking like she'd rather be anywhere but here. Madge could relate.

 

It wasn't that she disliked her mother, or ever really resented her for the way she acted.  Madge was old enough now to understand that not all of it could even be blamed on the Capitol; that some of it had to do with Madge, too. But even when she had been younger and clueless, Madge never felt that she was missing out, or shunted somehow. In fact, there was a time when her mother held Madge on her lap and taught her how to play piano - Madge was sure of it. Even if there were also times now when she wondered if she made that memory up.

 

"Sure," said Madge.

 

She waited for Mother to say... well, whatever it was that she came to say. Madge had a feeling what was coming, and she didn't quite know what to do about it. She had been prepared for an emotional speech or a lot of hugging on this particular day, but she'd only considered her father.

 

Mother shut the door behind her and sat on the edge of Madge's bed. She patted the spot next to her.

 

Reluctantly, Madge went to join her.

 

"Your hair's getting long," her mother murmured.

 

Madge shrugged. She watched her mother watch her. Whenever Mother looked at Madge she always had that mixed expression- part longing, part pain.

 

Madge had seen the photos. She actually looked more like Mother than she did Aunt Maysilee- and when she frowned, she looked especially like her father poring over his computer screen - but Mother probably didn't see that. People often saw what they wanted to see.

 

"How do you feel?" her mother asked.

 

Madge thought it was funny that her father had asked the same question earlier, when Madge had been down for breakfast. He had even made pancakes. Taya and Bree had put on their typical show of bickering over who should wash the dishes, and Father had bravely read his newspaper and kept his hand tremors to a minimum.

 

Thinking of that, and looking at her mother awkwardly biting her lips- a rush of warmth flooded Madge's chest and something sharp stung her nostrils. She had to blink, fast.

 

A day like today sure made people strange, herself included.

 

"It's only one slip," she told her mother.

 

"Right," agreed her mother, not looking at Madge. Again, this was amusingly similar to her father's reaction.

 

Madge knew the thoughts that ran through both her parents' heads. Theoretically. _Theoretically_ Madge's odds were in her favor. _Theoretically_ odds were all that counted. _Theoretically_ a father the mayor of a not-so-favorite district and an aunt previously reaped shouldn't count at all.

 

Madge supposed she ought to be more anxious, like they were. At school, she had heard, more than once, classmates discuss in low voices about the Games being possibly rigged. Well, Madge didn't need to hear that to guess. The Games were many things and entertainment was one of them. How authentic can "interesting" get?

 

But that was just it.They wouldn't bother rigging the slips unless they could make the show more _interesting_. And Madge did not think her back story would make her particularly interesting. Her father was, yes, not a very stellar mayor by the Capitol's standards - he didn't set curfews, he didn't whip people, he didn't ban music or drinking or shoes (there was actually a mayor who did that in District 8; Madge had read about it in the newspapers her father left around) - but he certainly had never tried anything... _facetious_ (was it for her sake? Madge tried not to think of that) _._ As for Madge's aunt Maysilee... she had been a relatively popular tribute, but a tribute who didn't win was just that in the end - a dead body. A loser.

 

She could not say this to her mother, however.

 

(Over the years she had learned it was smarter to keep some thoughts to herself. Not just because of her mother, but because of the looks she sometimes got, when she opened her mouth. That could be why kids tended to distance from her at school, and why she only got along with Katniss, who was pretty blunt herself.)

 

"What's that?" Madge asked, pointing to what looked like a shiny brooch in her mother's hand, figuring to change the subject to something lighter.

 

The way her mother's face suddenly froze, though, told Madge that had not been a good idea.

 

"Oh... this is... This is for you."

 

Madge had not expected _that,_ of all answers _._ "Me?"

 

"Here, I'll..." Mother leaned forward to attach the shiny-something to the front of Madge's shirt. "It's our tradition- my mother, and her mother, every generation we..."

 

Madge was only half-listening. She couldn't help it; she was too busy staring down at the small, round pin now pressed below her collar. Was that real gold? Madge had never seen real gold except on TV and in Capitol newspaper advertisements. For a second she could believe this pin came straight out of those ads- it was so beautifully crafted, there was nothing like this in District 12... Then she noticed the design.

 

"A mockingjay?"

 

She looked up at her mother incredulously. Mother raised her head to meet Madge's gaze, and nodded. "It was your aunt's," she said. Her breath hitched a little, but her eyes were calm.

 

Madge covered the pin automatically, as if not doing so the mockingjay would take flight and sweep into the sky... and die from a Peacekeeper's gunshot within a second.

 

Her imagination was going haywire, as usual, but Madge could swear she could feel a heartbeat beneath her hand, not her own, but that of this mockingjay... Of maybe Aunt Maysilee's spirit...

 

"Th-thank you." To Madge's horror, her nose stung again and this time the tears did well up.

 

She didn't even know why receiving this simple pin was such a big deal. She had never pegged herself as a sentimental person... but from her mother's face it seemed that her mother knew.

 

"You're welcome, honey."

 

That one word - _honey_ \- jotted that flashback of playing piano on her mother's lap once more... It was real.

 

Madge smiled. Her mother smiled back, if hesitantly at first.

 

Maybe they'll never be very close, but that was okay. Moments like this were enough.

 

It was twelve-forty by now, so Mother didn't stay long to chat - besides, there wasn't anything left to say, now that Madge knew why her mother had dropped by for an impromptu visit. Madge's dress was hanging on the door, freshly ironed by Bree just this morning, and Madge still had to brush out her hair and wash her face.

 

But those could wait.

 

Madge went to her desk and pulled out her notebook. She flipped to the page at the beginning and reached for her pen.

 

One hand over the delicate ridges of the mockingjay pin, the other crossed out the old title of her story, _The Rebel._

 

In its place she wrote neatly:

 

_The Mockingjay._

 

**Author's Note:**

> Rereading HG gave me so much feels again, especially for those characters we see so little of. The Undersees just really fascinate me (the Mellark family is a close second). I took some liberties with this... Madge's mom has always seemed to me a morphling addict. Even if she didn't look like one (but I'm thinking of Glee's Cory. Not everyone has to look like an addict to be an addict :/) I hope I did the 3 of them justice because so little fan attention is given to them!


End file.
